taxpayer money

The panel that oversights the TARP again accused the US government of supporting the wrong perception of financial firms that the federal authorities will always intervene to prevent big companies from failing.

Presenting its final report on the bank bailout the $700 bailout controlling panel said that the government was not articulating clear goals for its foreclosure prevention program. It also said federal intervention transformed the notion of 'too big to fail' into a stark reality.

As largest US banks Wells Fargo and Citigroup announced their plans to repay the taxpayer money the US government now can reduce its bailout investments in banks by more than 75%, stated the US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Monday.

He said: "With the recent announcements on repayments, we are now on track to reduce TARP bank investments by more than 75 percent, while earning a healthy profit on that commitment.”

 More than $98 billion in taxpayer dollars spent by government agencies was wasted, much of it on questionable claims for tax credits and Medicare benefits, representing an increase of $26 billion from the previous year.

In a prepared US Senate testimony Neil Barofsky, the special inspector general for the U.S. Treasury's $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), said that US taxpayers will likely fail to get their money back that were invested in financial companies. He noted that while these funds played a significant role in stabilizing the economic system the bailout may never fulfill certain policy goals.